


waking

by Carrot_Bunny



Series: 30 days NSFW Victuri challenge [10]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Doggy Style, Dreams, Feelings, Hope, Light Angst, M/M, Original Character Death(s), Regret, Sad with a Happy Ending, Self-Doubt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-09
Updated: 2017-02-09
Packaged: 2018-09-23 02:36:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9637169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Carrot_Bunny/pseuds/Carrot_Bunny
Summary: Day Three: Dreams“You’re Victor Nikiforov,” Yuuri says firmly. “28, born in Moscow, loves poodles and katsudon, can’t stand boiled eggs, skates as a hobby, and the man I fell head over heels in love with. And if I have to remind you every single day of our lives, I would gladly do so a hundred times over.”





	

Yuuri’s eyelids fly open with a gasp, and for a minute he just lies there staring at the ceiling while the wave of impending dread washes over him. Even in his barely awake state he quickly recognizes the unpleasant stirring in the pit of his stomach, like a premature echo of the turbulence to come, and then he hears the erratic thumping of a fist against the bedframe that confirms what he's realized. 

“Victor!”

He reaches across the bed and grips Victor's spasming arm, tugging the sleeve down to see the frost already covering his skin halfway up to the elbow, and Yuuri launches into action swiftly. Flipping his lover over, he pins Victor's wrists to the bedframe and binds them together with the synthetic silk restraints specially modified for this purpose, then makes sure his chin is propped up on the pillows so that he has room to breathe. He then grabs the small bottle on the nightstand and pours a thick stream onto his palm while he pulls Victor’s sweatpants off.

“Come on, come on,” he mutters frantically under his breath as he tries wriggling a finger into the puckered rim, letting out a sigh of relief when it finally sinks in down to the knuckle. He can feel the rectum muscle constricting around his forefinger in a reflexive action to expel the foreign intrusion and hear Victor unconsciously grunting in discomfort, but he persists anyway - compared to dealing with a full-blown snowstorm in their own bedroom this is a small price to pay. Soon he has three fingers stretching the the ring of flesh open, his other hand already coating his length with the lube.

Yuuri allows himself a brief intake of breath, then thrusts into Victor as he squeezes his eyes shut and concentrates.

* * *

_ “Did you hear about that Nikiforov boy?” _

He’s suspended in bitter cold, the only light in the otherwise pitch-dark space coming from a large hole above that fractures out into a web of cracks spanning overhead. Yuuri propels himself forward with a breaststroke and there they are, the smaller figure gripping the frigid form of the other as his long silver locks drift over blue lips that will never move again.

_ “He saw his son playing in the middle of the lake and tried to get him out before it was too late, but… well, you know the ice still isn’t solid enough at this time of year.” _

_ “What was the boy thinking, frolicking outside in this weather?” _

_ “Haven’t you heard? That child doesn’t feel cold like normal people do. He wasn’t even the least bit unwell when they pulled him out of the water, unlike his poor father. And his skin was as cold as the dead of winter.” _

The voices echo in the eerie silence, and he feels more than sees the boy turn towards him numbly. He opens his arms without a word, and in the blink of an eye the boy’s hands are holding onto his back as he buries his face in Yuuri’s shirt.

“Why isn’t Papa waking up?” he asks plaintively, and even though Yuuri’s heard the same words a dozen times before it still pierces his heart.

He’s entered numerous dreamscapes by now, been in all sorts of horrifying situations conjured by a person’s deepest internal turmoil and pain that threaten to force his heart out of his throat. In contrast, Victor’s dreamscape is nearly devoid of anything but a simple harsh cold, the one memory that he replays in his mind endlessly as if he could change its outcome by reliving it enough times. It usually remains buried deep inside, a razor-edged shard hidden under glittering snow, but when triggered the ancient powers of Winter’s full might would burst out of their mortal vessel and lay waste to everything in their path.

Attempting to curb a force of nature should’ve been impossible, but somehow Yuuri’s meagre abilities were able to push past the howling blizzard to reach the forlorn soul within, and although he’s no closer to finding the core of Victor’s emotions than he was during the first time (truth be told he suspects Victor’s powers may have eliminated his core entirely) he can still placate the storm if only for a period of time. He pulls the boy closer and caresses his head gently, never flinching away from the chill settling in his bones, and waits for his presence to be sent away by Victor’s subconscious as what usually happens once he’s calmed down.

_ “A heart of ice is as fragile as glass.” _

Yuuri raises his head in confusion, suddenly aware of the boy’s abrupt disappearance in addition to the change in environment. Instead of dark freezing water he’s now enveloped in a swirling mass of powdery snow, the stark whiteness sharp enough to slice through flesh 

“Victor…?” he calls hesitantly, for that was the voice he’d heard not a minute ago.

A moaning wind stirs up a cloud of snow, and suddenly a pang of lingering loss floods through him as he watches a barely adult Victor stare into the mirror while shearing his long hair off. He feels the tired desperation in the furrow of Victor’s brow as he takes in the aftermath of a devastating showdown, demolished buildings covered in a thick layer of frost. This is his core, Yuuri realizes, these are his past feelings finally surfacing from their frozen tomb beneath the ice, and their intensity almost overwhelms him as the next assault of resigned indifference comes with a view of a humongous lizard looming over a coastal town forebodingly.

Yuuri’s heart skips a beat. He recognizes the roofs and walls of Hasetsu.

_ “Team up with me, General!”  _ a voice cries, and he nearly buries his face in his hands. Overexerting his powers while trying to communicate with the mind of a giant reptile and then collapsing into the arms of General Winter of all people isn’t a particularly fond memory of his.

_ But why is this in Victor’s dreamscape? Is this part of his core too? _

He watches the days and weeks fly past, from General Winter’s announcement of his new partnership with Japan’s former top superpower Dreamcatcher, then Ice Tiger’s outraged arrival with the purpose of dragging his older comrade back to Russia, and all through the different crises they faced together. He witnesses again the frustration, the conflicts, the laughter, the adrenaline, and the happiness at being allowed to enter another person’s heart. And then the scene cuts to a back alley in Beijing half in flames.

_ “I don’t need you to do anything! Just stay by my side and never leave!” _

He hears the tortured inner voices of an entire city quiet down from mass hysteria into sleeplike bliss, the first time he’s attempted hypnosis on such a large scale. He watches as Victor lunges towards him, and it’s as if he can feel the velvety sensation against his lips once again. That was a first too, the way Victor’s touch had felt so passionately warm.

_ “Please take care of me until I retire!” _

There’s a boy standing a distance away from him again, shoulders shaking with sobs, but he looks nothing like Victor. With a jolt Yuuri realizes he’s staring at a younger version of himself, an exact replica down to the crooked rim of his old glasses. He might as well have stepped straight out of one of his childhood photos, or to be exact the photo of him with Vicchan on the little altar back in Hasetsu that Victor had asked about on the day he arrived.

“I wish you’d never retire.”

Yuuri blinks and suddenly Victor is there as well, crouching down to take the crying boy into his arms. Or at least he tries to, until something causes the color to drain away from his already pale face and he ends up holding the boy at arm’s length, as if fearful of contracting a disease. Then Yuuri sees the tendrils of ice snaking their way down the boy’s arms from where Victor’s hands grip his shoulders.

Victor isn’t afraid of the boy. Victor is afraid of himself.

“Yuuri… please…” the cyrokinetic whispers, but whether he’s pleading the boy or himself Yuuri cannot say. 

At his words the boy finally looks up though, and wipes his tears away steadily even as the frost creeps down his torso. A watery smile emerges on his face, and Yuuri wishes with all his being that he could quash the glimmer of relief in Victor’s eyes because he’s only going to hurt himself by putting all his hopes on that very wrong smile.

“After the task, let’s end this,” the boy says, and dissipates into a flurry of snowflakes as the crisp whiteness around them drips into a whirlpool of ink.

_ “You can’t help him. He’s better off without you.” _

“He asked me to team up with him! He fought by my side! He  _ loves  _ me!”

_ “Yes, but what do you have to offer him? He gave you everything he had and what could you do for him in return? Can you make him believe in himself again? Can you help him see how amazing he truly is? How can you, when you’re broken and shattered yourself?” _

“I… I thought I made him happy…”

_ “You were his colleague, nothing more.” _

_ “He admired your abilities, nothing more.” _

_ “He fell in love with an illusion, nothing more.” _

“Yuuri,” Victor sobs as he falls to his knees, “you’re not holding me back,  _ I  _ am. I’m dragging both of us down, like… like…”

_ “Like how you killed Papa. And if you don’t let go now, you’ll kill him too.” _

**_“NO!”_ **

Victor turns around at the resoundant shout, and his teary eyes widen in stock as Yuuri strides resolutely towards him, then drops down and wraps his arms around his shoulders to pull him flush against his chest.

“Yuuri… this is a dream, isn’t it?” he murmurs wonderingly.

“Yes, but  _ I’m  _ not.” Yuuri pulls back a little to press his forehead to Victor’s, looking him firmly in the eye. “I’m here, and I’ll  _ never  _ leave you. You can’t make me turn my back on you.”

Victor lets out a strangled sob. “Yuuri, you don’t understand, you have to go. You can’t stay with me, I’ll only harm you, I - ”

“You turned my entire life around the day you showed up in my family’s hot springs,” Yuuri insists. “You showed me the love around me that I couldn’t see for so long.”

“But I couldn’t help you in China, I wasn’t there for you in Russia, I even almost  _ lost _ you in Spain. I… I can’t save you.”

Tears begin to leak out of Victor’s eyes again, but Yuuri leans forward to kiss them away.

“You didn’t need to save me.” He brushes Victor’s sweat-streaked hair to the side and smiles tenderly. “You taught me how to save myself.”

Victor’s lips move wordlessly until they finally from words in an almost inaudible voice. “Did I?” he breathes. “Did I really do that?”

Yuuri’s eyes flutter shut, releasing the quivering drops welled up in the rim of his eyelids to trickle down his cheeks. “Victor, I can’t assure you that neither of us will ever stumble or lose our way ever again,” he confesses. “But I promise you that whatever lies ahead, I’ll always stay by your side - and I believe from the bottom of my heart that you’ll always stay close to me as well.”

The tension finally leaves Victor’s shoulders - and then he buries his head in Yuuri’s chest and bawls like a newborn infant. Yuuri cradles him and holds him tight while the violent sobs wrack his entire body, tears leaving a large wet patch on his shirt. Every drop is as hot as the springs in Hasetsu.

“I love you, Vitenka,” he whispers as Victor’s body finally stills.

“I love you too, Yurochka.” Victor looks up and finally smiles, like a beam of sunlight shining through the clouds.

“It’s about time I sent you back, isn’t it?”

Yuuri widens his eyes in surprise. “You know this is a dreamscape?”

“Yeah, I do. I mean, I didn’t at first, but once I saw you I realized. You have no idea how relieved I was when it hit me,” Victor says with a shaky laugh.

This is a revelation. Very few people become aware of their dreamscape after they wake up, and in all the years of Yuuri’s career he’s never known anyone to do so while still in slumber themselves. He cups Victor’s cheeks with his palms gingerly, feeling as if he’s standing on the precipice of something entirely new while staring it in the face.

“I’ll be waiting for you to wake up,” he finally says.

“Then I’ll see you in a bit.” Victor’s familiar grin appears again, the last thing Yuuri sees as their surroundings fade away.

* * *

When he opens his eyes he sees faint predawn light streaming in through the drawn curtains. Then his eyes fall on Victor’s startlingly blue pupils staring straight into his face, and it’s as if his vocal chords have dried up in his throat.

“This is an interesting situation,” Victor remarks as he flexes his wrists experimentally in the silk restraints.

“Y-you woke up before me,” Yuuri sputters.

“Yeah, I finally get to experience what it’s like to wake up with my boyfriend’s dick in me. It’s certainly a nice change from having to sleep in handcuffs.”

“Handcuffs?”

“I may have been sleeping in an insulated apartment back in St Petersburg, but I still might’ve frozen Yakov’s headquarters over if measures weren’t taken.”

No wonder he never said anything about the red marks on his wrists after waking up some mornings, as if he was completely used to spending his nights tied up like a prisoner –

“I’ll untie you now,” Yuuri says immediately.

“Oh no, it’s perfectly alright! Take your time about it, I’m in no rush.” Victor hums a small tune while Yuuri undoes the knots around his wrists hurriedly and massages his arms to restore the blood circulation in them.

“I’m really alright, you know,” he continues as he finds a comfortable spot on the pillows for his head to rest on. “I know that you know what you’re doing, and I trust you completely.”

“I know you do,” Yuuri replies as he tugs Victor’s shirt off, then continues kneading his tense muscles starting from his shoulders and working his way down his back. “I just don’t like the idea of you being bound up like that, like you’re some dangerous beast.”

“Well, I’m the manifestation of Winter after all,” Victor jokes half-heartedly, then sighs when Yuuri rubs firm circles into either side of his spine. “Ahh, that’s good.”

“You’re Victor Nikiforov,” Yuuri says firmly. “28, born in Moscow, loves poodles and katsudon, can’t stand boiled eggs, skates as a hobby, and the man I fell head over heels in love with. And if I have to remind you every single day of our lives, I would gladly do so a hundred times over.”

“What did I ever do to deserve you,” Victor mumbles happily as he tips his head back to meet his lover’s lips. What was originally meant to be a chaste peck soon heats up into something needy and consuming, both a plea and an assurance at the same time. Yuuri feels like he’s back in Victor’s core again, only more solid and intense and  _ real _ , and it’s enough to make him more than a little light-headed when they finally part.

“You were yourself. That’s more than enough to me,” he murmurs as he moves back to plant a kiss on Victor’s nape. Fingers trace the muscles on his bare back and around the sides of his ribcage to his chest, where they find purchase on his nipples and start toying with them. Victor moans appreciatively and dips his head into the pillow, hips bucking up into Yuuri’s thighs and sending more of his blood shooting downwards.

“How exactly did we end up like this again?” Yuuri asks with a chuckle as he glides his hands down Victor’s sides until they’re caressing his buttocks.

“ _ We _ -ell,” Victor drawls mischievously as he folds an arm under his chin for support so he can glance over his shoulder more easily. “I did wake up to your cock in me, didn’t I? You could call this a natural progression of events.”

“Idiot, I wasn’t trying to bone you in your sleep!” Yuuri laughs as he slaps Victor’s thigh lightly in amusement. “It was either take you from behind or let your powers literally freeze my brain, like they almost did the first time I tried to enter your dreamscape.”

“Luckily we’re dating then, otherwise things would’ve gotten pretty awkward between us,” Victor quips. He reaches for Yuuri’s hand and brings it to his lips, kissing the golden band reverently.

“This is the first attack since we came back from Barcelona, isn’t it?”

Yuuri pauses. “Now that I come to think of it, yeah it is,” he says slowly in realization. “Almost a month since the last one.”

“Long lapses aren’t out of the ordinary – I only broke down once last summer too, remember?” Victor props himself up on his elbows. “I was so busy training with you, trying to figure out how we could work together, that my mind must’ve forgotten to go haywire,” he muses.

Yuuri falls into a contemplative silence. “So what brought it on this time?” he asks finally.

“I think we both know the answer to that already.”

Yuuri looks down at where their fingers are intertwined together on the sheets. “If I’d known… I should’ve talked to you about how I was feeling before the task in Spain.”

“There’s a lot of things we both should’ve talked about… but now we won’t keep anything from each other anymore, right?”

“Definitely.” Yuuri rocks his hips forward carefully, smiling at the involuntary shudder that races down Victor’s spine. “So tell me then – what would you like me to do now?”

“How does fucking me into the mattress sound?”

“So uncivilised,” Yuuri chides as he starts to pull out slowly until his head is peeking out of Victor’s rim, then leans down to align his lips with the shell of his boyfriend’s ear. “You know I like to take things slow, take you apart bit – by – bit - before putting you back together again,” he whispers, accentuating each pause with a shallow thrust that provides just enough stimulation for Victor to groan into the pillows without actually giving him the pleasure he so desires.

“Take things slow? Sounds more like you’re afraid of a little chill,” Victor teases, hooking his legs around Yuuri’s knees and grinding backwards until he elicits a soft gasp from behind him.

“Oh, I like the cold a lot.” Yuuri wraps a hand around Victor’s erection and starts to pump him in time to his thrusts, increasing the pace gradually until Victor’s head is bowed to expose the pink flush spreading over his neck and shoulders. “But I’d rather keep you warm instead,  _ moye serdtse _ .”

A bead of sweat slides down Victor’s back, collecting at the base of his spine as he turns his head so Yuuri can see the thrill and adoration in his eyes, and he realizes neither of them will ever be able to leave the other for as long as they both live. They’re already a given, like the return of the spring at winter’s end.

“You always do,” Victor breathes as his lips find Yuuri’s again. “You always do.”

**Author's Note:**

> what up Hetalia reference ayyy
> 
> seriously though, why do I like making Victor suffer so much ;v;
> 
> I originally didn’t have any visual concepts for their superhero outfits, but then the Rage of Bahamut crossover event designs came out and I was like "holy shit they fit like a glove". That is, Yuuri’s original superhero outfit is the blue one and Victor basically told him he needed to burn it before designing him the Eros one. Also ice tigers probably don’t have wings, sorry Yurio.


End file.
